the daily snivel

I have to agree with Heather Mallick that men really do look better when they wear a tie. Responding to a column by Geordie Grieg, the editor of UK's Tatler who shaves his head and claims that ties are vanishing and good riddance to them, she says:

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I recently watched an episode of 24 in which Kiefer Sutherland was trussed Guantanamo-like (doubtless a typical Fox TV effort to make torture acceptable, dull even), burned, shot with electricity and injected with drugs to collapse his lung to encourage him to reveal the location of a computer chip.

Our Kiefer didn't cave. But he was quite the mess at the end of it all, exuding unfamiliar fluids at every pore.

Then I saw the Toronto Star's spread of celebrities photographed as they frolicked in the city that week. There was Mr. Sutherland emerging from a chic restaurant with a Desperate Housewife wearing a ruched yellow minidress so pretty it made me wish to have sex with her, and I'm not that way.

Mr. Sutherland looked as if he hadn't washed or changed since the impasse over the chip. Tie-less, shirt untucked, jeans that would disgrace a yokel after hay-baling, eyes desperate and gaping, you could still see the pillow wrinkles in his face. He was a rebuke to . . . something.

And yet some days earlier, Mr. Sutherland, wearing a suit and tie, was positively casting light over the Toronto Walk of Fame audience, such was his beauty. He was with his mother, Shirley Douglas, who was immaculate as always.

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Ties a) look like a phallus, thus planting the suggestion that you have another better one down below b) knot suggestively c) add colour and life to drab male suitings d) conceal the male neck which is often unwashed, wiggly and dotted with neglected beard hair e) impress police officers should you be stopped for speeding and f) give a woman a fine phony reason to compliment you. “I like your tie,” she says. She may be lying, but it's better than saying, “I like the old egg yolk glued to your chest hair under the missing button on your cheap shirt.”

Sometimes a woman who wants to sleep with you will pull you to her by your tie. Sans tie, sans head hair, she's left with your ear, which reminds you of school or maybe your mother.

Throughout law school and my work at the Legal Clinic, I've been regularly required to wear a suit and tie (sometimes daily) as I appear in court on behalf of clients or meet with Crown Attorneys to discuss a case. I've always enjoyed dressing up, because it prompts you to walk tall and feel confident, knowing that you look your best. As much as it may be a manifestation of classist tendencies in this society, looks matter, and in my profession appearance is equated with competence. A lawyer, male or female, appearing in court in a crisp suit or robes has a commanding presence that would be missing if he or she showed up in a sweat-stained shirt and jogging pants.

I don't think that men need to wear suits and ties on a daily basis -- it would be snobbish and classist and to think good looks are synonymous with fine clothing and neckties. Nevertheless, men do seem to get away with quite a bit of slack when they're supposedly dressed up -- not to mention the things we get away with when we're going casual -- and there's something to be said for putting in a genuine effort to look your best.

But surely it's even more than that. Women are indeed held to higher standards of dress than men are these days. Even with the rise of the metrosexual and "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy," and men who put "product" in their hair, men get away with far more slovenliness than women. In fact, isn't because of the decline of the heterosexual male that we need to learn how to better look after ourselves? We get away with several days' worth stubble on our faces when we'd gross out if women had stubble on their legs. We wear ripped t-shirts and frayed tank tops that have grown gray with age. Our toenails grow too long. We wear ballcaps indoors. We wear sandals and black socks. We let men grow those awful goddamn soul patches, for goodness sakes. I mean, rip them off!

Most people would tell you they take pride in their appearance, but there's nothing quite like a freshly pressed shirt and tie to truly say you're looking your best. It's not necessarily an everyday look, but there's no reason it should be relegated to nothing more than weddings and funerals. Even if you don't have cause to wear a suit and tie to your job, it can still be fun to dress up when you go out -- button up that shirt for a change, take off the hat, and give the jeans a rest (they cost more nowadays that most dress slacks anyway).

I know, at the end of the day, that it's not that simple. We have bigger problems in life than what we have to wear -- most people in the world are lucky if they have enough food. There's a hint of classism in the notion that one has to wear an expensive suit and tie to look your best (and let's be honest -- even if you buy your suit off the rack at a department store, and currently I'm one of those people who do -- a suit is expensive). We also live in a very superficial society where people are judged by their appearances more than the substance of their character -- though I'd always prefer the latter over the former. Still, I'm simply suggesting that those fashion experts who do care about appearance, and yet applaud the disappearance of the suit and tie, are missing the point entirely.